Digipak analysis One

Digipak analysis One

• 1.
  Lana Del Reyis an alternative indie style artist; I am going to analyse the digpak to her ‘Born to Die’ album to show how she presents her style and genre of music through using Lacey’s repertoire of elements. The mise en scene of the front cover presents Lana’s ‘classy’ style. Her hair is styled in a traditional 1960/40’s way with the large curls; she uses direct mode of address which we see her face being expressionless, this indicates to me that she takes her music very seriously and also may suggest what style inspires to be the way she is. The rural setting creates a working class stereotype which may indicate her own personal life or to purposely contrast against the 40/60’s upper middle class style that is being presented through her clothing/ makeup and hair. This rural setting also contrasts against her music genre, I don’t think the alternative/pop DigipakAnalysis –Lana Del Rey,Bornto Die Album genre which is her genre is conveyed through this front cover. The front cover extremely postmodern as it uses bricolage, creating confusion between 2012(when the album was released) and the 1940s era through mise en scene, costume especially. Another postmodern feature used is pastiche, she looks very similar to an actress in the 40s/60s era named Lana Turner, she may be paying homage to this actress or just that era of times which evidentially, through the front cover and the rest of her music albums/videos, she is inspired by. The artists make up is subtle which enhances her natural beauty and enhances her character, it maybe conveying that her music is raw material and she doesn’t overly edit her music unlike a lot of pop music artists do. She is wearing a buttoned up white shirt, the colour of the shirt portrays purity which could convey her character as religious and innocent, almost the idea that she is ‘angel like’. The fact that the shirt is buttoned up and is long sleeves conveys how Lana doesn’t have to overly sexualise herself to be noticed; this contrasts against other artists in the music industry especially in the pop genre such as Miley Cyrus. She consistently uses a red, white and blue colour scheme which is iconic of the American flag; this makes the album personal to her and pays homage to America which is where she is from. A lot of artists do this with their work as they like their audience to be able to recognise them through the use of consistent house style they use. The CD cover on the right is very simplistic which again conveys her soft/natural voice; the red rose may indicate a love or danger/warning narrative – this suggests the album is personal to her love life therefore intrigues her fans more to listen to the CD. The back of the cover is the names of the songs which feature on the album – this allows the audience to maybe notice their favourite songs which may encourage them to buy the CD. The layout is very simplistic and the image doesn’t look as though it has been overly manipulated through editing software therefore again emphasising that she her overall ‘look’ and music/performance style is quite naturalistic which appeals to her fans as they respect her more for her voice/talent rather than her entertainment skills (e.g. dancing performance).